I'll Forget About You

Summer was here. It’s noises in my ear, the smell of freedom overwhelming me when I would wake up at noon fully refreshed. Another school year completed, the sweet satisfaction that I had an entire three months away from school before I’d go back for the final year. It was scary, almost. Exciting and scary, and yet I found myself wishing that summer would just never end. Maybe some miracle would happen and I’d never have to go back.

I’m not sure what kind of miracle that would be, but I sure was hoping for it.

Anything to keep me from going back. Going back to where my entire group of three whole friends was. Where Garrett wasn’t.

My goal this summer was to forget about him. There were other guys around. I just happened to not be interested in any of them. Unfortunately the only boy I had ever found myself truly attracted to was one that I had never even come into direct contact with. A certain boy who lived in my neighborhood, who probably wasn’t sure in the slightest who I was.

But that was okay. He was going to be going to college at the end of the summer. This town was just going to be a distant thought in his mind as he lived it up in the parent-free realm. I’d just be stuck here, scraping my way through the year as I ached for freedom. Anything to get me out of here--and far away from here.

Speaking of, via Facebook I had learned that the school Garrett was going to was a few hours away. That was a disappointment of course, but the only thing that meant was that he would be out of sight. And they do say: out of sight, out of mind.

Well, we were three weeks into summer right now. He’d been out of my sight that long, and unfortunately he still wasn’t out of my mind. I’d pass his street about half the time I either left the neighborhood or came home. His car was parked out front on occasion. During the school year I had spotted that distinct yellow Chevy on quite a few occasions. I of course assumed though, that now this was his final summer before setting out into the “real world,” he had quite a few friends to visit, and not a lot of time to spend at home.

And thus slowly I tried to get out more. Anything to get myself away from home, away from the street he lived on. My life had significantly slowed down lately; my lack of friends and social abilities likely the cause of that one. While I was stuck at home being the only child with no siblings, my friends were currently off on vacations with their families. In that respect, I was currently quite lonely. No one was around.

I guess I would have to find something to pass the time.

So I took up walking. Walking with my dogs around the neighborhood. They’d accompany me to a certain street every time we went out. They didn’t know this of course, but taking them for walks was only a ploy to walk by Garrett’s house as many times as possible without seeming too suspicious. No one seemed to be stalking a stranger’s house when they had dogs with them, right? I sure hoped so.

At least I was getting out and around, even if the places I went defeated the purpose of getting away from Garrett’s house. If I went on a walk, the first place I wanted to go was by his house. So in this respect, while I was trying to get out of the house in order to get my mind off of him, it was a futile attempt.

“Alaina!” my mom called from the second story of the house. I was downstairs, slipping the dogs into their harnesses for the daily walk around the neighborhood.

“Yeah?” I called, turning around to face the balcony where she appeared.

“Are you going out on another walk right now?” she asked, her hair up in a towel from the shower I assumed she had just taken.

“Yeah,” I said dryly. What else did it look to be when the dogs were fastened to their leashes?

“Well, would you mind going to the store after you’re done for me? I need you to pick up a few things.”

I looked up at her with a furrowed brow. “Can’t you just go yourself? I’m kind of busy right now, and you’re just about ready.”

I actually had a few plans later in the night to see some friends. Mom didn’t know of this yet, but soon she would, of course. It was the first time in about a week and a half that I was hanging out with somebody. A few people were getting together tonight, and someone decided to call me up and invite me. I wasn’t the best of friends with this group, but seeing as how my main friends were off on vacation, I’d take it. Anything for a little socializing--as much as I lacked proper social skills.

“I have a doctor’s appointment though,” she whined. “And it’s gonna take a while. I was thinking you could pick everything up for dinner while I was gone, and then by the time I got home I could fix it up.”

I sighed. “Fine, I’ll do it. Why are you going to the doctor?”

“Just some annual check up. Nothing horribly interesting,” she said lightly. “I won’t be home for a few hours though, and by the time I get back it’ll be time for dinner.”

I nodded, making sure that the girls were secured in their harnesses before I opened the front door. They were jumping and running around, excited that we were getting ready to go out. You’d think that after almost three weeks of daily walks they would grow less and less excited, but they probably couldn’t remember that they had been on walks everyday for the past three weeks.

We started out the door, the two dogs pulling me while they eagerly made their way down the sidewalk. I watched as their noses stuck to the sides of the sidewalk, sniffing every little detail there was. Occasionally I had to pull them away from some neighbor’s yard, preventing them from making a mess that I didn’t want to clean up.

The weather was great today, as it always was. It was perfectly warm and sunny, bringing a smile to my face better than anything else ever could. I laughed as the dogs pulled me along, so eager to stick their noses in anything they could.

They were always so excited during the firs ten minutes of the walk, however every single walk ended the same. The dogs would be out of breath, dragging along on the way home. I suppose they didn’t really know how to pace themselves. I couldn’t blame them, they were only dogs.

We took a few different turns, walking down a different street than we had the previous day. The only reason I did this was so that I wouldn’t get bored going over the same streets again and again. To the girls though, it didn’t make any difference. I’m sure they never could tell which streets were which, and I could certainly guess that they never recognized the same routes we took. However, I made sure that we always kept one part of every walk the same. That special part of the walk was walking by Garrett’s house. About half of the time we went out I’d see his car parked, depending on what time it was. If it was before two PM, usually his car would be there. I guessed he was still sleeping around then. Any later than that though, and the yellow Chevy was nowhere in sight.

It was only slightly after noon, so I was hopeful and expecting to see the yellow Chevy parked outside of his house.

The dogs were still excited, pulling me along down the street. Every now and again there would be other dogs barking at us, usually standing up on a couch in the living room and looking out of the window, spotting us. I tried to move along quickly so as to not cause any disturbances.

We rounded the corner onto Garrett’s street. I sighed a tiny bit when I didn’t see his car out there, even though it was only noon. I wondered where he was right now, when he had left this morning, or if he had just never come home last night. None of those ideas were even relevant though, because it didn’t matter. Garrett and I had still never bumped into each other around the neighborhood, and chances were that we weren’t going to. He’d be leaving for college in a matter of months, and I’d be starting my senior year by the time he left.

I’m not sure why I hadn’t just given up on this yet.

The girls and I walked by his house, making our way onto the main road that his street connected to. The main road looped around to my own street. Slowly, the girls began to lose their wind. They slowed down, tongues protruding as they panted. I suppose the best part of the daily walk was the last leg, because then we could just walk slowly, and I could take in the sun and the scenery that I was already so familiar with. It was relaxing to just saunter along, not needing to be anywhere. I guess being outside was relieving in a sense, because I didn’t feel a single worry when I was walking around with nothing to distract me but my own head.

That in itself was enough to put me in quite the dither, however.

I opened the front door and the girls charged in, yanking me through the door and into the house. They rushed around, eager to go get water. I removed their harnesses, calling out to my mom that I was home. I wasn’t even sure if she was still here though, judging by the lack of life in the house, and also the lack of her response.

The water dish for the dogs was empty by the time they had both had their turns with it, and I refilled it.

Mom had left a note of all of the things she wanted me to pick up at the store, reminding me that she wouldn’t be home until after five.

I grabbed my keys, heading out to my white Jetta. The air-conditioning was blasting within moments of heading out on the road, cooling me off as the sun beat down through the windshield and onto my skin.

The parking lot at the grocery store was relatively empty, and I grabbed a spot towards the front of the lot. My purse was in the backseat of the car, rather warm to the touch when I grabbed it and slung it onto my arm. Mom hadn’t left me any money to go shopping, and I made a mental note to make sure she paid me back for however much I’d be spending on the items she wanted me to get.

After snaking my way through the store and loading up the shopping cart with the miscellaneous items mom had written on the list, I paid for everything, cringing slightly at how much money would soon be leaving my bank account via my debit card. The only thing I was glad about, was that mom would have to pay me back for this. I’m sure she meant to leave me money, but probably forgot in the rush to get to her appointment.

By the time I had maneuvered the shopping cart out of the store, my breath caught in the back of my throat. Just as I was about to walk over to my car, another car skidded in front of me, hastily driving out of the grocery store parking lot and turning onto the main road.

I knew that car. It was yellow, and it was a Chevy.

There of course was only one person I knew who drove that car.